Friday, November 20, 2015

From a strange planet - 9

Road webcam fascination

The silent pictures of Scandinavian traffic-webcams have a strange fascination for me. My previous outpourings of webcam obsession are here: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8. I've used video, fiction, literary criticism, art, forensic science and surveillance technologies to think through this window on far-away places.

Long term changes - longitudinal analysis

Because I've followed the webcams since 2013 I'm able to compare before- and after images and I'm able to notice both sudden and gradual changes. This time-wasting activity is strangely relaxing and satisfying. Maybe other people feel this when solving Sudoku puzzles.

Privacy enhancements

Some camera views have been obscured. I cannot look into some gardens anymore and cannot watch people stepping into the bus. Instead I see a nice Malewich-like abstract landscape intervention. This has its own charm.

And just for fun I searched the camera on StreetView, to get another view of the scene. Would I recognize the scene if I saw it from the non-camera viewpoint?

Who did it - not me!
I wonder if this privacy enhancement was a spontaneous action of the Norwegian road authority (Vegvesen) or if someone complained about invasion of privacy. Maybe they saw my weblog? (Wish I was so popular!)

And again a view of the camera for this scene, with the camera and a much more primitive shelter. And a Google camera that photographed it's own shadow while photographing a camera:

Tree cutting

And sometimes trees are cleared, revealing a deeper and wider view of the (non-) landscape. It was this tree that first drew my attention to this place. Now it's gone. And tire-tracks disappear spontaneously without human intervention.

And again I found the camera. Looking on Streetview I saw that this road runs along a fjord, I've been loking at this scene a whole year long and I never suspected it. And the box on the right is not for selling stuff, it's just a garbage bin.

Three minor changes. Otherwise nothing much changes in these far-away places.

Hello world!
Is there anyone reading this blog who lives near these places? Then we could do a live performance. (But I fear no one from Norway reads this blog. If you do ... contact me at urbanadventure at xs4all dot nl.)